4 Ohio hospital systems collaborate on care, costs

Thursday

Sep 5, 2013 at 12:01 AMSep 5, 2013 at 12:22 PM

Mount Carmel Health System is part of the latest group of hospital bedfellows in Ohio to go public with a series of initiatives aimed at cutting costs and improving the health of their employees and patients.

Ben Sutherly, The Columbus Dispatch

Mount Carmel Health System is part of the latest group of hospital bedfellows in Ohio to go public with a series of initiatives aimed at cutting costs and improving the health of their employees and patients.

Mount Carmel announced yesterday that it will collaborate with Cincinnati-based Catholic Health Partners, Akron-based Summa Health System and Cleveland-based University Hospitals through an independent organization called Health Innovations Ohio.

The group has worked together for more than a year but now has decided to publicize the partnership. That collaboration should benefit patients by reducing fragmented, uncoordinated care and making sure the work of specialists is better connected around the needs of the patient, said Jim Reber, Health Innovations’ president and CEO.

Mount Carmel and Summa Health have their own Medicare Advantage health plans, known as MediGold and SummaCare, respectively.

The collaboration already has helped those health plans expand beyond their primary service areas. The two plans will be available in 66 of Ohio’s 88 counties in 2014. They now are available in about 35, Reber said.

MediGold tends to be focused in southern Ohio, while SummaCare has a greater presence in northern Ohio.

As of July, MediGold had more than 38,000 members. It had revenue of $366 million in 2012.

All four hospital systems should benefit from sharing best practices, said Claus von Zychlin, president and CEO of Mount Carmel Health System.

He said the collaboration in some ways will function like a research group. He said it won’t detract from Mount Carmel’s affiliation with Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center, which was announced in June.

“We can’t just rearrange the deck chairs,” he said. “We have to look at ways to fundamentally change the way we deliver health care.”

Combined, the four hospital systems employ more than 70,000. The four systems are developing an approach they all can use in assessing the health risks of their employees, and they’re cooperating on programs to address smoking and obesity, Reber said.

The hospital systems also are in discussions with one of the state’s five Medicaid managed-care plans to better coordinate care for Medicaid patients, Reber said.

Each of the four hospital systems will separately negotiate the financial aspects of any deal with that Medicaid managed-care plan, which Reber declined to identify. But the quality initiatives pursued through those deals will be standardized, he said.

bsutherly@dispatch.com

@BenSutherly

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